A sorry situation is underway in the United States, in the unfolding tale of a young black Florida teenager, Trayvon Martin, shot and killed by a former house-party bouncer named George Zimmerman.

Early on, no charges were laid; and the impression quickly grew that it had been a racially motivated incident covered up by the police. Zimmerman is of mixed parentage, Latino and white (I note this only because of the nature of the story). Some news stories have described him as a “white Hispanic,” a novel categorization, quite possibly popularized just during the course of this story.

Zimmerman’s reported account says Martin was acting suspiciously; and for a while, he followed the black 17-year-old, even after having called police. He also is said to claim that he was attacked by Martin, and had his head pounded against the pavement. (Released footage from the day of the incident appears to show no major or visible injuries to Zimmerman. But there remains some contention on this point.) From the other side, it’s alleged that Martin was doing nothing except walking home with a bag of candy, and that Zimmerman, motivated solely or primarily by racial bias, shot him. Protests have sprung up. Race, and claims of racism, have become the story.

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The most important thing to note is that the story is incomplete. The full range of facts is not available, the investigation is not over and there are contradictions between the various accounts.

Yet that did not stop the President of the United States from making his opinion known, albeit in an indirect way.

“I can only imagine what these parents are going through,” Barack Obama told reporters. “When I think about this boy, I think about my own kids, and I think every parent in American should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this.”

He then added: “You know, if I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”

That’s a very personal way for a President to respond. It is puzzling why he would offer no cautions about holding fire till the facts are known.

The Zimmerman/Martin story also has been taken up by Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, who have placed it in the service of their favourite theme: the unebbing racism of white America. It is being grooved to serve as an emblem, a symbolic illustration of a favoured, politically explosive narrative: That America is still as racist as it ever has been. Some group called the New Black Panthers even offered a $10,000 bounty for the arrest of Zimmerman. Protesting alleged vigilantism by acting as vigilantes is evidently not an irony too far.

Finally there is film-maker Spike Lee, who posted Zimmerman’s home address to his over-200,000 Twitter followers. It was outrageous for him to do so — a tacit invitation to harassment and worse. What’s more, it was the wrong address: Because of Lee’s attempt to gin up this story, two elderly people, David and Elain McClain, have had to flee their home under a barrage of misdirected death threats.

Does it need to be said that playing this kind of identity and race politics is often dangerous, and always wrong? If indeed Zimmerman turns out to be some murderous bigot, then that consideration in itself is all the bad news the world needs. Does he also need to be a kind of living proof, this “white Hispanic,” that American race relations are as poisoned as they ever were?

People are not symbols. Facts are not plastic, to be heated and molded to produce a narrative. The news is not a parable. Martin Zimmerman is not “white America” any more than Trevyor Martin is “black America.”

We should stay our own judgments in this case, hold on to the presumption of innocence, drain politics from the story, and await what the courts have to say. Insofar as such people can be, those who would inflame this story should be ignored.

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